


Haleth and Ioreth, Alive

by bunn



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Beleriand, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2017-03-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 21:08:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10317011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bunn/pseuds/bunn
Summary: When day came, bringing a brief respite, Haleth took her father’s armour.  Ioreth took her brother’s. No need for speeches from Haleth, who might well be the last leader of the Haladin.  Everyone knew that the only hope was to hold on.   And they fought on: Haleth and Ioreth,  sword in hand, and very little hope.Canon-typical violence.





	

They piled the dead behind the hall. There was no time for burials. 

They shared the last of the bread as the Sun rose red beyond the trees and the orcs drew off. They would be back in the evening, but while the sun was high they hid in the shadow of the trees. Ioreth’s tired face was filthy. She stank of sweat and orc-blood. So did Haleth, and her father, and her brother. 

There was very little food left, only fear and water. The stockade which had been a refuge had become a trap. Within the wooden walls, children too afraid to scream were sobbing quietly. 

Only children too small to carry a sword were left with time to sob. Anyone tall enough to fight was adult already, by default. 

No food left at all, now. 

“We have to fight our way out,” Father said. An orc-arrow took him in the eye as he led the sortie. After that, there was no more talk of fighting their way out. 

Haleth’s brother Haldar ran, ran through the orcs, to grab his father’s body, to drag him back within the gates. He made it, too, just about, though he took wounds on the arm and on the thigh, like a hero. Haleth dragged her father’s body to the heap, and came back, sword in hand, to stand by Ioreth. 

Orc-blades are poisoned. The wound fever took Haldar. He was two days dying. Haleth held his hand during the day, but at night, she fought, as more orcs came, and more, shrieking through the dark. Then she hauled her brother behind the hall, and ran back through darkness to the stockade to hack at orcs rushing the flimsy wooden barrier, again, again, again.

When day came, bringing a brief respite, Haleth took her father’s armour. Ioreth took her brother’s. No need for speeches from Haleth, who might well be the last leader of the Haladin. Everyone knew that the only hope was to hold on. And they fought on: Haleth and Ioreth, sword in hand, and very little hope. 

There was just time for brief sleep, under the blessed protection of the Sun, then desperate exhausted kissing. Clinging to life, to warm flesh and breath, hands fumbling under leather armour borrowed from the dead, hands tangled in lank sweaty hair, touching, holding, rubbing, thrusting. Affirming that here are Haleth and Ioreth, alive, in love, for a few more hours at least. Haleth and Ioreth, mortal, dying, yet alive, alive and kissing away the sweat and tears. 

On the seventh night, as the blackness filled with enemies began to turn at last to the faint grey of dawn, as the sunrise caught golden on the very tops of the trees, a sound, almost on the edge of hearing. A golden sound, the sound of hope, the sound of elf-horns calling. 

Haleth caught Ioreth by the arm and pulled her in for a clumsy kiss, as at last, at last the orcs turned to run. “We’re going to live!” 

The elves were swift, and beautiful and deadly with their shining eyes, an immortal vision of something far beyond Middle-earth, and yet, they were not so beautiful as Ioreth’s tired mortal eyes. 

Here for this brief passing moment, all the more bright and shining for being brief, Haleth and Ioreth are alive.


End file.
